Summary
How biomarkers impact treatment decisions. Biomarkers indicate that a patient’s immune system knows that the tumor is there.
How biomarkers impact treatment decisions: Biomarkers play an important role in treatment decisions of many tumors, but in lung cancer they are a deciding factor between which immunotherapy is the best option.
Treatments for lung cancer have recently become more personalized thanks to the increasing study and use of biomarker testing in patients prior to immunotherapy treatment. Biomarkers provide clinicians with insight as to what treatments may work best, and the widespread use of biomarker testing is helping to drive treatment decisions and improve outcomes.
What are biomarkers and how do they impact treatment decisions?
At the CURE® Educated Patient® Lung Cancer Summit, Dr. Melissa Johnson discussed the different types of biomarkers that are driving decisions for patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC). Her main focus was on the widespread PD-L1 tumor mutation burden and microsatellite instability (MSI) that are known for their roles in other cancers but play an important role in determining immunotherapy treatment for patients with SCLC.
In an interview with CURE®, Dr. Johnson, director of the lung cancer program at the Sarah Cannon Caner Center in Nashville, Tennessee, discussed how these biomarkers help drive treatment decisions.
